I had a great weekend down at the second annual Bunbury Music Festival. I did not make last year’s festival as I was out-of-town, but everyone I talked to had such positive things to say about it, that I went ahead and bought tickets for this year before a lineup was even announced. I would have preferred to have a few more acts on the bill that I was already familiar with, but I found some new acts that I really enjoyed. Plus the festival was very family friendly and in a great downtown setting. I feel it is worthy of buying again for next year before any bands are announced.

New bands that I discovered and really enjoyed include American Authors, Delta Rae, Empires, The Mowgli’s, Twenty One Pilots, A Silent Film, and Black Joe Lewis. I was also very surprised and impressed by Robert DeLong, who’s electronic style does not normally fit my tastes. However the amount of energy and ingenuity with instruments that he displayed was top-notch. Plus he had everyone in the large crowd up and dancing along, many of who I assume also do not typically listen to his style of music either.

The food and beer were not outrageously priced. In fact most of the food trucks and vendors that I saw inside the festival gates were charging the same amount as they normally would in other scenarios. All beers were $6 for what I think was a 16 ounce cup, excluding the craft beer village which was a $1 more per cup. Even though I prefer craft beer, I would have paid the extra money just to not have to wait in longer lines for domestic beer.

The policies in place for the festival are wonderful. You can come and go as you please, which allowed our kids to take a break from the festival for a few hours and still come back later in the evening. Also kids 10 and under are free with a paying adult, which is a very nice touch. They truly have created one of the best festival settings I have been to.

My one complaint that I hope can somehow be addressed would have to be large crowds at the main stage as the evening goes on. I know that large crowds are going to happen, so it seems that there needs to be a larger space for the crowds to grow. Each night the crowd would spill out onto the sidewalk next to the stage, making it very hard to get back and forth from stage to stage. There is a much larger lawn where they had the Bud Light stage setup this year, and I think that could be a much better solution for future years, even if it means not using the built-in stage and orienting the main stage in a different direction. I really think it could work and would alleviate some of the congestion issues. Other than that, I was definitely impressed and I will absolutely be back for more next year.

Cincinnati has yet another brewery open and creating great beer, Rhinegeist Brewery.

Outside

They opened two weeks ago in the old Christian Moerlein bottling facility just two blocks north of Findlay Market on Elm Street.

Bar

They are pouring four different beers currently. I just tried Truth, their take on the very popular IPA, and I was very impressed.

Mural

My friends who have tried all of their beers are partial to Truth and Uncle, their English mild.

Brewing Equipment

The brewery space is slightly elevated but barely separated from the massive tasting area.

Huge Space

I can’t wait to check it out again and taste more of their beer offerings.

After driving through the night, my family and I arrived on Hilton Head Island just in time for breakfast. Since we had plenty of time to waste before we could get into our rental home, we decided to meet another carload of fellow vacationers at Skillets Café & Grill in the Coligny Plaza Shopping Center.

Inside Skillets

Our table of six adults and two kids was seated immediately upon our 8:30 arrival. The restaurant was filling quickly though, so be sure to get there early if you don’t want to encounter a wait.

Bloody Mary

Our group was already in vacation mode, so we ordered a round of Bloody Mary’s and mimosas. I didn’t sample the mimosas, but I enjoyed the spicy Bloody Mary throughout our meal.

Child’s Kitchen Sink

My son was very hungry so we asked for his food to be brought out as soon as it was ready. We ordered the child’s kitchen sink for him with a Mickey Mouse pancake, one egg, a sausage link, and a strip of bacon ($3.95). It was a lot of food for our two-year-old, but the price was fair.

French Toast

For my breakfast I went with french toast, the skillet way ($6.99). This is three thick slices of fresh bread, batter dipped, grilled golden brown, sprinkled with powdered sugar and topped with honey butter. This was delicious and I would definitely order it again. I also had a sausage patty ($1.99) on the side, which seemed like the same patties that McDonald’s uses. I was not a fan.

Vegetable Scramble Crepe

My wife had the vegetable scramble crêpe ($8.29), which is basically a large breakfast burrito, but wrapped in the thin crêpe instead. I did not try the crêpe, but I did share the side of “true grits” that came on the side along with a biscuit. The southern grits were very good and true to style, though I still prefer my grits with cheese.

Overall our group was very happy with their meals. We would not hesitate to return to Skillets on future trips to Hilton Head.

If you could not already tell from my silence last week I was out on vacation. We stayed in a large seven bedroom house on the beach of Hilton Head, SC. There were three separate living areas in the house along with it’s own pool, hot tub, and tiki bar outside. Joining us for the trip were my parents, my brother and his girlfriend, my grandparents, three aunts, three uncles, and a couple of cousins.

The weather wasn’t ideal, but it definitely could have been worse. Most days were limited to just 30 minutes or so of rain. We did have a couple of beautiful days that left my skin a little red. Most of our days were spent lounging in the pool, riding the waves in the ocean, biking on the beach and many roadside paths, drinking local beer and frozen cocktails, preparing meals for dinner, and sharing stories with our extended family.

More posts will follow in the coming days with specific restaurant reviews, but here are some random photos from my phone that won’t fit in any of those entries.

Hilton Head on Dwellable

We were treated to a double rainbow while sitting on our front porch this evening. It’s a little faint to see the double, but it did stretch the length of the other. I’ll now spend the weekend looking for the double pot of gold!

Double Rainbow

Today I was reading about The Six-Pack Project from the author of This Is Why I’m Drunk. Basically the idea is to get six beer bloggers from six different states to post a list of six beers that best represents each state and/or the state’s beer culture. I first heard of this today while reading Queen City Drinks’ post for Ohio and Hoperatives’ post for Kentucky. Tom, the author of the Queen City Drinks post, picked a couple of Cincinnati beers for his Ohio selections. This got me thinking about my favorite beers from Cincinnati. The two that he picked would also be in my list (the first two) and it didn’t take me too long to think of my other four.

• MadTree PsycHOPathy IPA – the best IPA brewed in the Cincinnati area
• Triple Digit Chickow! – a very powerful hazelnut porter, clocks in at 10%
• Blank Slate Fork In The Road – an India amber ale, more maltier than typical IPA
• Fifty West Kelly’s Roadhouse Stout (Nitro) – just had this for the first time last week and I am still thinking about it
• Mt. Carmel Amber – the flagship beer from one of the area’s first craft breweries
• Rivertown Roebling Porter – vanilla and espresso fill this nearly black porter

So far The Six-Pack Project has had two editions, meaning twelve states have been covered. I know that I look forward to searching for some of the South Carolina beers mentioned by Drink. Blog. Repeat. on an upcoming trip to Hilton Head. What would be in your six pack?

As I mentioned at the end of last week, I spent the weekend out in Noblesville, Indiana for two nights with the Dave Matthews Band. The area around the Klipsch Music Center, aka Verizon Wireless Music Center, aka Deer Creek, has changed a lot over the nearly fifteen years and thirteen shows I have seen at this venue, but it still continues to be one of my favorite places to catch a show.

We (myself and a dozen or so friends) do as we always do and stayed at the excellent Sleepybear Campground, which is directly across the street from the venue’s parking lots. New this year was an RV that some friends had rented, while some others in the group slept inside the farm-house for an added fee. I continued as I normally do and pitched my tent for sleeping under the stars.

Crew Cart

Our afternoons were spent playing cornhole, tossing a football, grilling food, and hanging out with a great group of friends. Of course stories from years past were shared, some of which have been told every year since. An old friend of mine is now a member of the DMB crew and he even stopped over on a branded golf cart for a surprise visit. Good to see you, Rick, and thanks for letting me get a quick photo on the cart.

Crazy Dancing Dave

Aside from a freak afternoon storm on the first day, which left some of my belongings soggy, we had great weather to go along with the music that was just as great as ever. The combo of “Best of What’s Around” and “Ants Marching” to close out the show on the first night was about as good as it gets for me. Other highlights included “Spoon” with opening act Brandi Carlile on vocals, “So Damn Lucky,” and “Hunger for the Great Light.” There were no songs repeated between the two nights, which I love to see. Overall it was another incredible weekend at Deer Creek.

Killer Light Show

Below are some additional photos I snapped at the shows.

Tomorrow is the first of three Dave Matthews Band shows I will catch this summer. I’ve been streaming all sorts of their music to get me ready for an awesome weekend ahead. There are tons of excellent videos on their own YouTube channel, take this clip from last year’s performance at Riverbend for example.

In addition to these official videos, there are some really great fan created videos as well. One of the best is @Copperpot5’s YouTube channel with tons of multicam videos synced with fan recorded audio. They compile shared amateur recordings, clean, deshake, and mix them together with others of the same performances. Some of the videos are even entire shows. I’ve embedded one example from another show I attended last year.

Sure the officially licensed professional videos are better, but these amateur ones aren’t too far off.

Saturday night I found time to go see one of my favorite performers from back in the day, Mike Perkins. This was my first time seeing him play in over six years. Fortunately the show was at the Mad Frog, a place I’ve seen him play many times before, and many of the songs were just as I remembered them, including some old songs from The Shantee, Perkins’ former band.

Mike Perkins & John Zuk

Joining Mike Perkins for the evening was bass player extraordinaire, John Zuk. Zuk is a frequent collaborator with Perkins and is always a treat to see him play.

With Brandon Vitruls of Jamwave

Opening the show was Jamwave, a band that I’ve been trying to see over the last several months. I met their singer and guitar player through mutual friends. After a late arrival, I only caught a few of their songs  but I liked what I heard. Their acoustic set with two guitars and a djembe was great, and I’m told their full band performances are even better. I’ll be on the lookout to see them again soon.

Yesterday was my third Father’s Day celebrating with my own children. Unbelievable to think how quickly time is passing by.

Father’s Day Card

I also got to spend some time with both my dad and father-in-law. We played nine holes of golf, something that they both love to do.

Perfect Form

An added bonus was that dad’s golfed for free!

Ed Paff Sr.

Kim and many of her siblings were also on the course with us.

Kim and Chuck

It was a great way to celebrate with our dads and the course even threw in a free lunch for everyone.